Women in the Gospel of John

Paper Summary:

This essay discusses and analyzes the prologue to the Gospel of John in an attempt to interpret the role of women in the text. The paper then narrates the instances in which women appear in the book and critically examines them with reference to said prologue.

From the Paper:

"The author of the Gospel of John concludes his testimony with the following: "But there are also many other things that Jesus did; if every one of them were written down, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written" (New Oxford Annotated Bible John 21.25). One supposes, then, that the author employed a certain degree of selectivity in recording the important events of Jesus' life. Thus it is striking that the book treats women in individual instances to the degree that it does. There is some evidence to suggest that the author of this particular gospel was especially interested in the role of women in the life of Jesus. If the topic of women is important to the exegesis of the text, it is crucial to examine it carefully if one wishes to understand the gospel as a whole. As such, there has been no shortage of scholarship on the issue, both regarding the broad theme and the individual women in the book. Scholars have come to various conclusions, from criticisms of John's portrayal of the mother of Jesus (Lieu) to unabashedly feminist views of the Samaritan woman (Farmer)."

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